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Simon Kaine
Background My life, like most, began at my birth. I have never known my mother, nor has anyone come forth that was able to describe her in any great detail. I know she must have been beautiful though, for her features were striking enough that she had become a courtesan of the House of Kaine. It was there that I was conceived, the marriage of elven blood long separated by time and class with noble birth right and wealth. Except that it was not... My mother died in childbirth, absolving any potential father to be of any need to claim responsibility for his deed. I grew up without knowing about my heritage, the lineage of my ancestors or the grand history of my line. I grew up knowing about the workings of stables and the daily operations of a squire. The only parents I remember were the kind yet firm faces of my Patronage. It was not until much later that I even thought to ask the meaning of the word, I simply grew as their ward. Taking up service to their name and in turn being given shelter and learning under their tutelage. In reality, these two would turn out to be my Aunt and Uncle... the brother and sister in-law to my true father but to me they were my mother and father, even if it was never said. We lived on an estate just outside Cathargas, a large manor with a sprawling wine field beside it. Father would spend most of his time in city dealing with politics as mother tended to the matters of 'hobnobbing.' There were a number of times I would make trips with my mother to Uthida, both as an educational expedition for my benefit as well as to solidify family relations with other noble houses in the Senate. While these visit were typically rather boring, it did serve to teach me the layout of the local area and to meet people in higher echelons of government. One such meeting will haunt me to the rest of my days. Mother, myself and two local officials were on a short ride in the country. Both as a lesson in horsemanship for me and some political deal she was trying to make away from the numerous advisers one of the men had surrounding him at all times. This time he only had one with him, so I guess things were better from my mothers point of view but I can hardly tell. The rest of that day is rather like a blur... From the tree line came a hail of arrows that first fell the horses of my mother and the nobleman she had come to meet. In fear, my own horse kicked back and nearly bucked me from it as another volley came raining down upon us. I still do not know if it was an assassination attempt or merely wandering brigands taking what they could get. Once I got my horse to calm down and looked back on the scene, my always kind and gentle heated mother lay in a pool of her own blood. Her body pierced by a number of arrows as her frame laid unmoving. A swift glance to the two men saw them hiding behind the fallen forms of their own horses, using their cadavers as a shield from the reigning death. I do not know if it was fate or sheer luck that kept me alive through those first few shots. I was no more trained in combat than these men, no more able to dodge an arrow than my dear mother, yet here I remained and there she lay. I do know what happened next was sheer stupidity.. In a fit of rage I charged at those woods, not knowing the number of men awaiting me nor their intent. I simply forced my steed ahead and raged into the forest. As I said, that day ended in a blur that has thus far escaped my senses. The next thing I can remember past that is wandering down some road, covered in blood and without my horse with a stab wound in my arm and an arrow through my leg. The first building I came across was a former home of a Priest-General, now being used by the very same religion he used to command. They were quick to take me in and heal my wounds, without question or concern as to their origin. For this I was grateful, for had they asked I would have had no answer to give them. Eventually I came to understand that this was a fighting order, still dedicated to keeping the very same skills honed that they had used under the Priest-General who had commanded them. I found myself in these men, purpose given by strength and understanding. Perhaps is was foolishness heaped upon foolishness, but I did not go home... Just as I seemed to have run from my mothers death I now also ran from my fathers reaction. I stayed at the church, I trained with the fighters and I learned the ways of religion. In time, as it always comes to pass, there was more fighting. As it was, a sect that opposed the teachings of the church I had grown to call home again was seeking to make war. Not merely against the teachings of the church but the region as well. Their creed seemed to be on the lines that strife creates strength and thus cared not how many died in order to create a stronger peoples. That is, of course, their view from my vantage. I might say different had I wandered into one of their camps instead of where I had wound up. It was here that I wound up though, and here I protected, joining with my new found brothers and sisters in a holy campaign to wipe out this sect of evil before it destroyed life as it had been to be replaced with their perverse notion of things. It was those battles that made me the man I became, I grew more on those battlefields than I ever did learning the proper methods for grooming a horse or how to run a winery at my patrons home. I was a man forged in the fires of war, bred for the righteous fight itself. Many years passed before the foe was vanquished. 'The Foe' ... I always enjoyed that they called themselves that, it made things easy and impersonal when met on the field of combat. It surprised me when the fighting was over, that I had become so used to it that its absence seemed to have left a hole in me. A hole that was soon filled with something else, something foreign and unexpected. A fathers love... When I last came back to the church, there was an envoy from Carthagas awaiting my return. I can only assume it was some sort of search that my father had done to try and find me, lest there by envoys all across Nagarst which seemed wholly impractical. The envoy carried a message of sorrow for the loss of my aunt and his desire to see me return to our home. I was confused by the Aunt part and overall I think it was this that caused me to return more than anything, the anxiety over having to confront my father over my mothers death was still something I dreaded to do. I made the trek back home with thoughts of all these things circling around in my head. When I finally made it back, the welcome I received was more akin to a returning hero than that of a returning son. The guards of the manor all stood at attention, saluting me as if they had forgotten the days I had spent shoveling shit out of the stables. When I finally reached my father, he hugged me and smiled as he expressed how happy he was to see me and how proud of me had was. The tales of my exploits on the field had made it back to him during the search to find me that he had proffered. Apparently he had thought me dead or captured after they had found my mothers body. It was during this time that he told me that they were not my mother or father. The true meaning behind the message revealed, the reason for the aunt and the reason why the envoy had no idea why he was so confused. My fathers relation... it seemed so strange, like a dream. They had taken me in as their ward, knowing my true lineage even when my real father would not accept this. As their duty to the family line they raised me as one of their own but still I was considered nothing. No more than any elven slave... no, that wasn't true. I was their ward, which raised me above most in both station and position and that's something else that changed that day. For my valorous deeds and heroic bravery in the service of the Nagarst Hegemony I was Knighted. While I could never claim true birthright from my real father, nor lineage from my patron father... I was now considered a noble of my own right through my powers of combat. That night there was much celebration, so much so in fact that it constitutes the second and final blur in my life. I suppose I like the drink but the drink doesn't like me. I shall have to consider this more fully the next time someone should suggest a celebration in my honor. The party would not be the thing of note, however, but that which came after which changed my life forever. That night, I found myself floating through the sky... a very disconcerting prospect I should tell you. Around me an infinite number of cubes floated by, each with a different surface with different spectacles occurring on them. All around me, the familiar din of battle, sometimes sounding distant and sometimes as though I were in the very center of it all. I floated there for what seemed like an eternity, simply taking it all in until I noticed a single spec in the distance that was growing larger by the second. As I waited, it grew into a human shape and finally into the clear form of a warrior. Clad in both bronze and steel armor, it towered over me as it stopped itself mere feet away. He claimed we were alike, claimed that the glory of battle stirred in our chests both the same. That the deeds done in times of war shape the very essence of life for those that follow and that I knew such things deep down, for they had been expressed in actions he had taken notice of. I don't believe he ever said it, but I knew him as Theroq. A god of soldiers unprayed to for over a thousand years... how I knew was beyond me, as was most the scenery surrounding me. When I awoke the next morning in my bed, I knew it to be divine providence. A holy inspiration from Theroq himself, not simply for his sake but for the sake of all. Strife would surely come again to the known world and things would change as they always do. Theroq wished for his word to be spread, for his church to rise anew from the ashes of battle as it always had. I would be his messenger, his voice in a world where he had none. The fallen word of Theroq would find a home in Nargast again, and then the rest of the world. That is why I write this now, chronicling my past and what led me to this point. Just enough to give you the reader an explanation for my motives and what drove me to this. I now set out to scribe Theroqs holy word and spread it to those who need it most...